Effects of additives and ingredient sizing on the shelf-life of "Amaretti" cookies

Cookies are characterised by moisture and water activity (aw) higher than 7% and 0.5, respectively. Cookies have the capacity of bending after baking, when they are fresh, unlike biscuits that break when bent. Hardening is the main cause of quality deterioration of cookies, which change from soft and pliable to firm and crumbly within a few days or even hours after baking. Little research has been done on cookies. "Amaretti" are typical Italian cookies, found in several regions of Italy. Freshly baked "Amaretti" are soft and delicious but undergo severe hardening after seven to ten days, thus limiting the shelf-life, so Amaretti can be marketed only locally. In the present work several attempts have been made in order to extend the shelf-life of Sardinian "Amaretti". In particular, changes to the formulation and to the almond particle size were made. The traditional formulation was, in fact, modified by adding rice starch (thickening agent) or mono-diglyceride of fatty acids (emulsifier). Almonds were grinded to a particle size lower or higher than 1 mm. Amaretti baked with the traditional recipe were used as control. After baking and cooling cookies were wrapped with an aluminium foil and stored at controlled temperature and humidity. Evolution of texture (as hardness) and aw during storage were followed instrumentally by a texture analyser and a hygrometer, respectively

Antibiotics mastitis therapy: drug residue in lambs

Meat coming from suckling lambs (max 12 Kg BW) is a typical Sardinian taste dish, normally consumed during the religious linked feasts. The aim of this work is to evaluate drug residues in suckling lambs meat as consequence of antibiotics mastitis therapy in their mothers during lactation. The study was performed on twelve Sardinian ewes, that had lambed within two days of one another, with suckling lambs from a single flok of 150 animals. Milk bacteriological screening showed that 10 ewes out of 12 were positive and Coagulase-Negative Staphylococci were identified. The ten positive sheep were divided into two groups A and B, and each of them were given two successive intramuscularconsecutive intramuscolar injection of 6 ml of oxytetracycline OTC (Terralon 20% LA, Virbac) within 72 hours; the two negative sheep were used as control (C group). With the two ewes Group two trials were conducted: to the A treatment started 17 days after delivery, while group of 6 ewes, drug administration was given when lambs were 17 days old, to the B has been treated 28 days after delivery. During the experimental period milk was sampled twice a week; 5 milk samples/ewe for group A and 2 samples/ewe for group B were collected. Lambslambs were regularly slaughtered at about 35 days old and muscle tissue has been collected.sampled. All samples were immediately frozen until analysis. Oxytetracycline milk residues were measured by High Performance Liquid Chromatography with diode array detector while, for OTC tissue levels, LC/MS-MS technique was used. OTC concentration in milk, as observed in our own previous study, decreasedranged from 3,500 to 0,050 μ g/ml over three weeks. OTC residues were detected in both groups of lambs at levels below Maximum Residue Limit (MRL 0.100 μg/g). In order to avoid any drug residue in food chain, and an increase of drug resistance, national legislation should pay attention to avoid use of antibiotics in ewes feeding lambs that will be slaughtered

Bioconversion of ovine scotta into lactic acid with pure and mixed cultures of lactic acid bacteria.

Abstract Scotta is the main by-product in the making of ricotta cheese. It is widely produced in southern Europe and particularly in Italy where it represents a serious environmental pollutant due to its high lactose content. With the aim of evaluating whether scotta bioconversion into lactic acid can be considered as an alternative to its disposal, besides providing it with an added value, here the growth, fermentative performances, and lactic acid productions of pure and mixed cultures of Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus helveticus, and Streptococcus thermophilus were evaluated on ovine scotta-based media, without and with the addition of nutritional supplements. The outcomes indicate that ovine scotta can be utilized for the biotechnological production of lactic acid with yields up to 92%, comparable to those obtained on cheese-whey. Indeed, the addition of nutritional supplements generally improves the fermentative performances of lactic acid bacteria leading to about 2 g l−1 h−1 of lactic acid. Moreover, the use of mixed cultures for scotta bioconversion reduces the need for nutritional supplements, with no detrimental effects on the productive parameters compared to pure cultures. Finally, by using L. casei and S. thermophilus in pure and mixed cultures, up to 99% optically pure l-lactic acid can be obtained

A Cognitive Robot Control Architecture for Autonomous Execution of Surgical Tasks

The research on medical robotics is starting to address the autonomous execution of surgical tasks, without effective intervention of humans apart from supervision and task configuration. This paper addresses the complete automation of a surgical robot by combining advanced sensing, cognition and control capabilities, developed according to rigorous assessment of surgical require- ments, formal specification of robotic system behavior and software design and implementation based on solid tools and frame- works. In particular, the paper focuses on the cognitive control architecture and its development process, based on formal modeling and verification methods as best practices to ensure safe and reliable behavior. Full implementation of the proposed architecture has been tested on an experimental setup including a novel robot specifically designed for surgical applications, but adaptable to different selected tasks (i.e. needle insertion, wound suturing)

Evoluzione chimico-fisica, sensoriale e della texture di un formaggio fresco pecorino confezionato in atmosfera modificata durante la shelf-life

This paper reports the results obtained from the analysis of a fresh ewe’s cheese packed under different modified atmospheres during the shelf- life. Cheese stored in 80% N2/20% CO2, at the end of the shelf-life was better than cheese packed with a 10% CO2, both for sensory characteristics and for rheological parameters, specially for the puncture force and hardness and chewiness obtained from the TPA assay. The colour was slightly more yellow than the cheese stored with 10% CO2. Il presente lavoro riporta i risultati ottenuti dall’analisi di un formaggio pecorino fresco conservato in atmosfera modificata mediante due differenti condizioni e prodotto ad una settimana di distanza uno dall’altro. L’analisi dei cambiamenti fisico-chimici, di texture e sensoriali durante la shelf-life, ha evidenziato che il campione conservato in atmosfera modificata con una percentuale di N2/CO2 pari a 80/20 si è rivelato qualitativamente superiore rispetto a quello conservato con una percentuale di N2/CO2pari a 90/10, sia per quanto concerne le caratteristiche sensoriali sia per i parametri di texture, in particolar modo per la forza alla rottura in compressione e per la durezza e masticabilità all’analisi TPA, anche se ha mostrato un ingiallimento del colore leggermente superiore rispetto alla prova conservata in miscela di gas 90/10

Macrospin dynamics in antiferromagnets triggered by sub-20 femtosecond injection of nanomagnons

The understanding of how the sub-nanoscale exchange interaction evolves in macroscale correlations and ordered phases of matter, such as magnetism and superconductivity, requires to bridging the quantum and classical worlds. This monumental challenge has so far only been achieved for systems close to their thermodynamical equilibrium. Here we follow in real time the ultrafast dynamics of the macroscale magnetic order parameter in the Heisenberg antiferromagnet KNiF 3 triggered by the impulsive optical generation of spin excitations with the shortest possible nanometre wavelength and femtosecond period. Our magneto-optical pump-probe experiments also demonstrate the coherent manipulation of the phase and amplitude of these femtosecond nanomagnons, whose frequencies are defined by the exchange energy. These findings open up opportunities for fundamental research on the role of short-wavelength spin excitations in magnetism and strongly correlated materials; they also suggest that nanospintronics and nanomagnonics can employ coherently controllable spin waves with frequencies in the 20 THz domain

Effectiveness of active and modified atmosphere packaging on the shelf-life extension of a cheese tart

The shelflife extension by MAP and AP of a typical cheese tart was studied. Baked tarts were packaged inside barrier to gas trays and wrapped with a barrier to gas and water film. Four batches were prepared: 1) Control; 2) MAP with different N2/CO2 ratios (70/30 and 20/80); 3) Trays with an iron oxide-based oxygen absorber. Tarts were stored at 20°C and sampled for analysis at 0,7, 14,27,35 and 48 days. Determinations inc1uded microbioIogical analyses (total bacterial count, moulds, yeast and staphylococci), chemical-physical parameters (pH, water activity and dry matter), gas changes (CO2, O2 and N2) inside MAP and AP trays, texture evolution and sensory analysis at our laboratories. AP allowed a shelf life of 48 days, MAP shelf lives were of 14 and 34 days for 70/30 and (20/80), respectiveIy, while controI tarts spoiled after only 7 days

Short term outcome of myocarditis and pericarditis following COVID-19 vaccines: a cardiac magnetic resonance imaging study

To evaluate clinical and cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) short-term follow-up (FU) in patients with vaccine-associated myocarditis, pericarditis or myo-pericarditis (VAMP) following COVID-19 vaccination. We retrospectively analyzed 44 patients (2 women, mean age: 31.7 +/- 15.1 years) with clinical and CMR manifestations of VAMP, recruited from 13 large tertiary national centers. Inclusion criteria were troponin raise, interval between the last vaccination dose and onset of symptoms < 25 days and symptoms-to-CMR < 20 days. 29/44 patients underwent a short-term FU-CMR with a median time of 3.3 months. Ventricular volumes and CMR findings of cardiac injury were collected in all exams. Mean interval between the last vaccination dose and the onset of symptoms was 6.2 +/- 5.6 days. 30/44 patients received a vaccination with Comirnaty, 12/44 with Spikevax, 1/44 with Vaxzevria and 1/44 with Janssen (18 after the first dose of vaccine, 20 after the second and 6 after the "booster" dose). Chest pain was the most frequent symptom (41/44), followed by fever (29/44), myalgia (17/44), dyspnea (13/44) and palpitations (11/44). At baseline, left ventricular ejection fraction (LV-EF) was reduced in 7 patients; wall motion abnormalities have been detected in 10. Myocardial edema was found in 35 (79.5%) and LGE in 40 (90.9%) patients. Clinical FU revealed symptoms persistence in 8/44 patients. At FU-CMR, LV-EF was reduced only in 2 patients, myocardial edema was present in 8/29 patients and LGE in 26/29. VAMPs appear to have a mild clinical presentation, with self-limiting course and resolution of CMR signs of active inflammation at short-term follow-up in most of the cases

Technical and Functional Validation of a Teleoperated Multirobots Platform for Minimally Invasive Surgery

Nowadays Robotic assisted Minimally Invasive Surgeries (R-MIS) are the elective procedures for treating highly accurate and scarcely invasive pathologies, thanks to their abil- ity to empower surgeons\u2019 dexterity and skills. The research on new Multi-Robots Surgery (MRS) platform is cardinal to the development of a new SARAS surgical robotic platform, which aims at carrying out autonomously the assistants tasks during R- MIS procedures. In this work, we will present the SARAS MRS platform validation protocol, framed in order to assess: (i) its technical performances in purely dexterity exercises, and (ii) its functional performances. The results obtained show a prototype able to put the users in the condition of accomplishing the tasks requested (both dexterity- and surgical-related), even with rea- sonably lower performances respect to the industrial standard. The main aspects on which further improvements are needed result to be the stability of the end effectors, the depth per- ception and the vision systems, to be enriched with dedicated virtual fixtures. The SARAS\u2019 aim is to reduce the main surgeon\u2019s workload through the automation of assistive tasks which would benefit both surgeons and patients by facilitating the surgery and reducing the operation time

Development of a cognitive robotic system for simple surgical tasks

The introduction of robotic surgery within the operating rooms has significantly improved the quality of many surgical procedures. Recently, the research on medical robotic systems focused on increasing the level of autonomy in order to give them the possibility to carry out simple surgical actions autonomously. This paper reports on the development of technologies for introducing automation within the surgical workflow. The results have been obtained during the ongoing FP7 European funded project Intelligent Surgical Robotics (I-SUR). The main goal of the project is to demonstrate that autonomous robotic surgical systems can carry out simple surgical tasks effectively and without major intervention by surgeons. To fulfil this goal, we have developed innovative solutions (both in terms of technologies and algorithms) for the following aspects: fabrication of soft organ models starting from CT images, surgical planning and execution of movement of robot arms in contact with a deformable environment, designing a surgical interface minimizing the cognitive load of the surgeon supervising the actions, intra-operative sensing and reasoning to detect normal transitions and unexpected events. All these technologies have been integrated using a component-based software architecture to control a novel robot designed to perform the surgical actions under study. In this work we provide an overview of our system and report on preliminary results of the automatic execution of needle insertion for the cryoablation of kidney tumours